Sheakley v. State

Opinion

2026 WL 1678514

Only the Westlaw citation is currently available.

NOTICE: UNPUBLISHED OPINION

NOTICE

This is a summary disposition issued under Alaska Appellate Rule 214(a). Summary dispositions of this Court do not create legal precedent. See Alaska Appellate Rule 214(d).

Court of Appeals of Alaska.

Sergius Alex SHEAKLEY III, Appellant,

v.

STATE of Alaska, Appellee.

Court of Appeals No. A-14557

June 10, 2026

Appeal from the Superior Court, Third Judicial District, Anchorage, Peter R. Ramgren, Judge. Trial Court No. 3AN-14-10533 CR

Attorneys and Law Firms

Sergius Alex Sheakley III, in propria persona, Juneau, Appellant.

Donald Soderstrom, Assistant Attorney General, Office of Criminal Appeals, Anchorage, and Stephen J. Cox, Acting Attorney General, Juneau, for the Appellee.

Before: Allard, Chief Judge, and Wollenberg and Terrell, Judges.

SUMMARY DISPOSITION

*1 Sergius Alex Sheakley III was convicted, based on a plea agreement, of two counts of second-degree sexual abuse of a minor.¹ Sheakley now appeals, raising three claims.

First, Sheakley asserts that he received ineffective assistance of counsel from several attorneys during the pendency of his case. But a defendant is “generally forbid[den] ... from raising ineffective assistance of counsel claims [for the first time] on direct appeal.”² This is because “an evidentiary hearing is almost always a prerequisite to an effective assertion of ineffective assistance of counsel.”³ As a result, a claim of ineffective assistance of counsel must “be argued first to the trial judge either in a motion for a new trial or an application for post-conviction relief.”⁴

Because Sheakley did not raise his claim in the superior court or through an application for post-conviction relief, there is not a sufficient record to evaluate his claim. As a result, his claim is premature. If Sheakley wishes to pursue this claim, the proper remedy is to file an application for post-conviction relief, where he can fully litigate his claim that his attorneys were ineffective as well as any other claims he believes entitle him to withdraw his plea.⁵

Second, Sheakley argues that his constitutional right to a speedy trial was violated. But “a defendant who pleads guilty or no contest waives all non-jurisdictional defects” unless the defendant explicitly preserved the issue through a special plea agreement known as a Cooksey plea.⁶ A speedy trial violation is not a jurisdictional defect.⁷ And Sheakley did not explicitly preserve, as part of his plea agreement, his claim that his right to a speedy trial was violated. To the contrary, as part of his plea agreement, he expressly waived his right to appeal any defects in his case. Therefore, the speedy trial claim is waived.

Third, Sheakley argues that his conviction violates his constitutional right against double jeopardy.⁸ Under Alaska law, a double jeopardy claim is akin to a jurisdictional defect and thus may be raised on direct appeal after a guilty plea unless expressly waived.⁹ But Sheakley's plea agreement expressly required that Sheakley waive his double jeopardy claim as a condition of his guilty plea. During the plea colloquy, the superior court twice informed Sheakley that he was giving up his ability to raise a double jeopardy claim as part of the terms of his guilty plea. And after both explanations, Sheakley said he understood and agreed to this waiver. As a result, Sheakley's double jeopardy claim was expressly waived and he cannot raise it on appeal.

*2 The judgment of the superior court is AFFIRMED.

Footnotes

1

AS 11.41.436(a)(3).

2

Grinols v. State, 10 P.3d 600, 613 (Alaska App. 2000), aff'd in part, 74 P.3d 889 (Alaska 2003).

3

Barry v. State, 675 P.2d 1292, 1295 (Alaska App. 1984).

4

Id.

5

See Alaska R. Crim. P. 35.1(a)(1).

6

Foy v. State, 515 P.3d 659, 660 (Alaska App. 2022) (quoting Chandler v. State, 487 P.3d 616, 621 (Alaska App. 2021)); Cooksey v. State, 524 P.2d 1251, 1255-56 (Alaska 1974) (allowing courts to accept a special plea agreement where the defendant pleads no contest but maintains a limited right to appeal a specified, litigated, and dispositive issue).

7

Deacon v. State, 575 P.2d 1225, 1227 (Alaska 1978) (holding that a “[v]iolation of one's right to a speedy trial is non-jurisdictional” and may only be pursued after a guilty plea if expressly preserved as part of that guilty plea).

8

Sheakley does not expressly raise a double jeopardy claim. Instead, he asserts that “Judge Wolverton's dismissal lacked jurisdiction. Sheakley had not yet been indicted, and the case was suppose[d] to go back to a district judge.” This appears to be a reference to an argument Sheakley pursued in the superior court: that his case violated the prohibition on double jeopardy because the State reindicted him after his case was dismissed under Alaska Criminal Rule 5. Because Sheakley is representing himself, we construe the above quoted language from his appellate brief as raising a double jeopardy claim on these grounds. See DeNardo v. Calista Corp., 111 P.3d 326, 330 n.12 (Alaska 2005) (endorsing proposition that courts may “ignore the legal label that a pro se litigant attaches to a motion and recharacterize the motion in order to ... create a better correspondence between the substance of a pro se motion's claim and its underlying legal basis” (quoting Castro v. United States, 540 U.S. 375, 381-82 (2003))).

9

Lemon v. State, 654 P.2d 277, 279-80 (Alaska App. 1982) (explaining that double jeopardy claims are part of a specified category of claims that may still be pursued after a guilty plea unless the defendant “intentionally relinquish[ed]” the claim as part of the guilty plea).

End of Document